


Flintstone Gummies

by WhumpTown



Category: Prodigal Son (TV 2019)
Genre: Dad!Malcolm Bright, F/M, Mom!Dani Powell, Parents Malcolm Bright and Dani Powell
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-08
Updated: 2020-05-08
Packaged: 2021-03-02 17:33:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,746
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24070642
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WhumpTown/pseuds/WhumpTown
Summary: “Let’s go home.” It sounds too good to be true. He’s got a healthy little girl, a beautiful wife… It’s more than he ever thought possible.
Relationships: Malcolm Bright & Dani Powell, Malcolm Bright/Dani Powell
Comments: 3
Kudos: 69





	Flintstone Gummies

_**“It is not attention that the child is seeking, but love.”** -Sigmund Freud_

They have a sleepy love. Seldom do they have declarations and grand gestures between them. With wedding bands golden and diamond-studded, Malcolm still shyly brushes his fingers against hers before Dani takes his hand in a reassuring squeeze. Each time he’s a little certain she’ll pull away. They don’t kiss in the office. Rookies don’t even notice their relationship until Dani leans too close to Malcolm while working or someone happens to catch the ending of a heated argument between the two.

Roses remind her of death. Crowded areas make him anxious. Their love isn’t defined in fancy restaurant candlelit dinners or flowers sent to the office as a cute surprise. They do more tangled arguments on the couch. A weighted blanket atop a heated blanket, legs tangled, lying chest-to-back. Criminal Minds plays softly in the background to their argument, fading in and out as they profile and dish out parenting drama.

_“Your child, today-”_

_“Oh, so she’s your child when she’s good but mine when she’s bad?”_

_“Duh.”_

Most of the time, they just love silently. The proof of their love is a four-year-old who sleeps like her father and a head full of hair like her mother. She’s a thin, absolutely wired, animal cracker fiend.

And a slight germaphobe. 

_Malcolm groans, throat raw, and fever high. He’s achy and trembling._

_“Daddy?”_

_Malcolm looks up to find his daughter, the child he once held for an entire night when she was sick. The child who never failed to throw-up on him before work, little baby vomit on a tie, his pants, or dress shirt five minutes before he plans to leave. The child he loves with his whole heart. “What’s wrong, kiddo?” The child that is currently looking at him in disgust._

_Kennedy is looking up at him with big worried eyes. There are no tears, yet, but he can sense they are rapidly approaching. He can’t sit up, his head spins and he really doesn’t feel like vomiting near his four-year-old. Reaching out to take her hand but she takes several steps back instead._

_He curls up into himself, wincing. His chest hurts, achy and cold he’s miserable. “Ken-” he wraps his arm around his waist, on his side, he nearly falls off the couch. Miserable out of his mind, he rolls onto his back. Glassy eyes fixed to the ceiling._

_He blinks himself awake, not having realized he’d momentarily fallen asleep. Little rapid-fire feet on the floor make him lookup. In a sweatshirt older than she is, hood pulled up, the plaid scarf Dani got him for Christmas wrapped around her face, and kitchen mittens on her hands she walks determinedly up to the couch._

_“You look…” she looks him over, regarding him like a specimen under a microscope. She puts mitten hands on her hips and sighs. “You look **disgusting** , daddy.” Mercifully, she frowns sadly at him and puts a hand on his chest throwing herself up on the couch with him. “I miss Mommy.”_

_He covers his mouth, attempting to shield her from his coughing. She looks disgusting. “I miss her too,” he wraps an arm around her. “She’ll be home this evening though.” If he survives a few more hours of fever and coughing fits._

Dani never understood why children are always talked about like they’re little parodies of their parents. Describing them as always looking like one parent and acting like another. That is until she had a child of her own. One that looks like the spitting image of her but acts just like Malcolm. 

_“Today is mommy’s birthday!”_

_Dani blushes under his attention, it’s just a little too early in the morning for his overwhelming enthusiasm. “I’m thirty-five,” she tells Kennedy, scooping her daughter into her lap. Sharing Kennedy’s shocked expression of this news._

_Gently, Kennedy takes Dani’s face in her palms. Her expression turns worried, “mommy, that’s so old.”_

_Dani barks out a laugh, turning to look to Malcolm for comment or anything from him. He just winces and shrugs, turning back to the pancakes he’s in the process of making for her. Dani rolls her eyes before smiling down at her daughter. “Sweet angel,” she whispers, “daddy is thirty-nine.”_

_Kennedy gasps, looking over at Malcolm._

_Malcolm turns around from the stove, eyes big like this is news to him too. “Am I old?”_

_Kennedy nods somberly, “super.”_

_They share a laugh, shaking their heads at their daughter’s grim news._

_Malcolm clutches his chest. “Dani,” he calls, dramatically, hand going to his forehead. “I fear I shall faint from… from oldness!”_

_Dani grabs Kennedy, standing from the chair with her daughter in her arms. “Oh my love,” she mimics his dramatic pitch. “I fear I shall faint and fall over too!”_

_Pushing the pancakes away from the burner he makes a dramatic show of stumbling towards them. “Catch me, Ken! Catch your old man!”_

_Kennedy screams with joy, kicking and thrashing in an attempt to get away from them both. She’s pulled down, laying on her mother as she pretends to have fallen. She screams as her father looms over them, falling to his knees and then gently laying himself over her. “Daddy, no!” She can’t wiggle away._

_Dani digs into her sides, Malcolm rolling so that he can balance himself with one arm and engage in terrorizing their child too._

_Kennedy caves quickly, “you’re not old! You’re not old!”_

She has a childhood that is nothing like theirs. 

Dani is a detective and Kennedy thinks this is the coolest thing she has ever heard of. At kindergarten, she tells everyone about her mom, if asked she will add that Malcolm works too but he’s “just a consultant”. Dani is her hero in every sense. She wants to be a detective too or James Bond. She’s pretty sure it’s like the same kind of job but she’s got plenty of time to make her mind up.

She’s a daddy’s girl at the end of the day. Malcolm has a shadow in his daily life. Before she went to school, he was home with her every day. She never really understands him, not all the way. He’s a mystery to her, at the end of the day in so many ways.

_“Daddy’s just a little sick,” Dani’s on her knees in the living room unsure of how to explain life to a six-year-old. **“It’ll get you down sometimes!”** feels both unhelpful and pessimistic. If there’s one thing she’s learned, though, it’s that kids are both resilient and understanding so she aims high. “Daddy is depressed, it’s why he takes those medicines in the morning.”_

_Kennedy’s eyes light up in understanding, mouth slightly agape in the cutest little O. Just as quick, she frowns. “Wait!” She puts her hands on her hips, “do daddy’s medicines not work like Flintstone gummies?”_

_Dani tries not to look obviously amused by her daughter’s question. To be fair, she and Malcolm do tell her that the gummies keep her from getting sick, and for the most part, they do. She’s also Malcolm’s child so of course, they also had to tell her the doctor gave them to her specifically so she could grow up and become James Bond._

_Unsure of how far she should take the gummy route and unsure of how upset Malcolm’s going to be about her very truthful answers, Dani is stuck. She sighs, “uhm…”_

_Kennedy waves it off, “oh, right! I forgot!” She pats her forehead with a little grin, “daddy’s medicine is to keep his brain from getting sick because he took his gummies as a kid!” She rolls her eyes like this conclusion was obvious the whole time. “Duh, mommy, because you don’t need to take gummies to grow up if you've done grown up!”_

_Dani nods because that is a better answer than she could ever come up with on her own. She’s also secretly thrilled to tell Malcolm about it when he’s feeling better. For now, she’ll keep it under wraps but she has a feeling Kennedy is going to try and feed Malcolm Flintstone gummies tomorrow morning._

_“Can I go see daddy then?”_

_Dani shrugs, “wanna take a nap with us?”_

_Kennedy thinks about it for a moment, obviously not thrilled because she thinks she’s being tricked into a nap. She also wants her dad though. She bites at her lip, fingers picking at her lip. “Okay.”_

Dani is in Gil’s kitchen when she hears her child banshee scream in the yard. She looks up, 99% sure that her husband is getting their child wound up. She doesn’t get the chance to investigate. Tally comes around the corner, eyes-rolling. “I wouldn’t.”

For a moment, she’s confused. Then another scream from the living room and Tally just shakes her head again. Dani doubles back to the kitchen, following Tally back to the kitchen. 

“Gil says there’s stuff to make-” Tally bends over, half in the fridge. She lets out a deep laugh, a very happy chuckle. “Haha!” She holds up a package, which Dani doesn’t quite recognize. “Alcohol!”

Another banshee scream, Malcolm’s giggling, and what sounds like Gil’s rumbling voice sound out. Dani nods, “I can use some of that.” 

Two hours later, they’re giggling messes. 

“Mommies funny,” Kennedy tells Malcolm. Tucked away, the evening burning into night they’re all exhausted. Dani is pressed into Malcolm’s side. He’s got his arm wrapped around her shoulders, letting her press her face into his neck. 

Kennedy is in his lap, ear under his collar. She’s playing with his shirt, a ploy she often uses to keep herself from falling asleep. Malcolm rubs her back. She’s gotten so big that he nearly hopes she'll fall asleep in his lap and give him an excuse to carry her to the car. 

“Let’s go home,” Dani asks, pressing a kiss to Malcolm’s cheek.

Malcolm looks between them, warm and comfortable. 

“I’m not even tired, yet, daddy.” Kennedy sits up, yawning and rubbing at her eyes. Blinking, she looks at Malcolm with tired little blue eyes. 

Malcolm chuckles, pulling Kennedy close so he can wrap both his arms around her. “Alright,” he decides. “Let’s go home.” It sounds too good to be true. He’s got a healthy little girl, a beautiful wife… It’s more than he ever thought possible. 

_**“We choose not randomly each other. We meet only those who already exists in our subconsciousness.** -Sigmund Freud_


End file.
